


Santa's Little Helper

by clgfanfic



Category: War of the Worlds (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-20
Updated: 2013-02-20
Packaged: 2017-11-29 23:24:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/692720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clgfanfic/pseuds/clgfanfic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some deliveries are harder than others</p>
            </blockquote>





	Santa's Little Helper

**Author's Note:**

> Originally published in the zine Green Floating Weirdness #8 under the pen name Gillian Holt.

 

_"Let's chalk it up to the spirit of Christmas and go back to bed?"_

 

          It was a dark and stormy night, but then, it usually is at the North Pole in December.  And with nothing much to do during the nine months of darkness that descends on the bleak and barren location, it should come as no surprise that the indigenous elves who live there had long ago hired themselves out to the one Anglo stupid enough to move up there, Mr. Claus, who just happens to be one of the oldest surviving immortals.  However, being something of a coward, he decided that living at the North Pole on holy ground was a surefire way to insure he'd be the last one left alive.

          Santa (the elves though that was a really stupid first name, and guessed it was just a pseudonym, but hey, he was paying the electric bills so they didn't pry), taught them many things to help pass the time, not the least of which were how to make toys, how to break and enter almost any residential dwelling, and certain highly classified special operations warfare techniques to make sure they survived when travelling abroad.  And, on one night of the year the elves got the opportunity to demonstrate to Santa just how well they'd learned their lessons.  They competed for the coveted title of 'Best Damned Elf in the Santa Corp,' although, if the truth be told, what they really wanted was what came with the title, a two week vacation in Florida, but no one ever mentioned that to Santa.

          This year was no different, and all of the elves were in a hurry to make their deliveries and get back in time to catch some football on the satellite dish.  The magic reindeer the elves bred for food, hide, bone and transportation were groomed and hitched to their sleighs, and each elf reported to Santa for his or her allotment of gifts and a map, showing where the deliveries were to be made.  (Santa had long ago given up actually doing the work himself.  After all, what good was great holy ground if you didn't stay on it, and what good was cheap labor if you couldn't exploit it now and again.  Besides, Mrs. Claus liked having the one night a year with the house empty of all the elves…)

          This year was different for one particular elf, however.  Little Lorelei Elf, or LE for short, was undertaking her very first special operations mission.  She'd just graduated at the top of her class, so Santa wasn't too worried when he realized that he'd given her one particularly tricky delivery.  With a shrug, he handed her the bag of goodies and smiled.

          "Good luck, LE.  If I were you, I'd save the houses I marked for last."

"Thanks, Santa, I'll do that," she said, and headed for her waiting sleigh.  After checking the lead deer's nasal-mounted-night-vision-enhancer, she climbed on board and headed out for northern California.  She'd been hoping for something further south, but it wouldn't be a total loss if she got the change to buzz the traffic on the Golden Gate Bridge.

 

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

 

          Lorelei was feeling great about her mission.  So far everything had gone according to plan, and almost all of her gifts had been delivered ahead of schedule.  There were just two more houses to go, the ones Santa had recommended she save for last.

          As she circled over the large property, she couldn't see why the old man was worried.  It looked like a nice enough place – on the coast, lots of trees, a pond, and barn and corral (maybe they had reindeer, too?).  And there were two houses on the property, the big two-story job and a smaller, but sprawling one-story neighbor.  She checked the additional instructions and saw that Santa wanted her to visit the one-story location first.  He thought that might be safer.

          Well, it was no skin off her nose one way or the other, so LE reined the team of eight reindeer around and dove down to the quiet house.  Just as she passed over the larger dwelling, the lead deer's nasal-mounted-night-vision-enhancer burned out.  There was no time to think.  She pulled back on the reins, bringing them down on the big house's roof in a perfect emergency landing.  Her flight instructor would be proud.

          However, without the aid of the enhancer, the deer were finding it difficult to see in the dark and her lead deer lost his footing, landing on the roof with a thud and clatter of tiny jingle bells.

          LE leaped lithely over the edge of the sleigh and ran up to help the prostrated deer to his feet.  (Now, it should be mentioned here that elves have many magical traits, one of which is the ability to move rather quickly when compared to humans).  As Lorelei finished resettling the deer, the world erupted in a blare of sirens and lights.

          "Oh, great," she muttered, scampering back to the driver's seat.  "Just what I need.  Advanced electronic security."

          With a crack of her tiny whip, the deer sprang off the roof and she steered them into the relative shadows of one of the large maples growing nearby.  Placing the deer in an automatic circling pattern, she watched as humans burst from both the houses and converged in the small parking lot.  They were well armed and Lorelei wished she had one of their spiffy Heckler & Koch submachine pistols for when she had deliveries in L.A.

          One of the humans barked out several orders and the rest dispersed in a classic search and destroy deployment pattern.  LE was impressed.  Here were some humans who knew a little something.

When most of the humans were out of sight, searching the grounds, LE pulled out her small, high-powered infrared human detector and trained it on the smaller one-story structure.  She was in luck.  No one had stayed behind inside the house.  She could make her delivery.

          She calculated the distance to the smaller house's roof and noted the two chimneys.  Either one was large enough to hide the reindeer, but the furthest one was in more shadow.  She nodded confidently to herself (elves are _always_ confident) and took control of the deer.  The team streaked off in an arc, landing in perfect silence behind the second chimney.  Mission a success.

          Grabbing her magic bag of holding (boy, were she and the other elves glad when Santa decided to use the new negative weight models, they cut the weight of the gifts a hundredfold and spared many of the elves their usual yearly back strains), LE skipped to the top of the chimney and glanced down.  A small fire was snapping at the bottom, but she knew it wouldn't be a problem with her fire-retardant uniform.  With a twitch of her nose, she shot down the narrow opening.

          Stepping out at the bottom, LE took in the surroundings and was impressed.  It was all very orderly, just like back in the Elf Academy, but there were lots of nifty weapons, too.  Spotting the small Christmas tree in one corner, its red, white and blue lights blinking on and off, LE hefted the bag onto her shoulder and headed over.

          It only took a moment to deliver the gifts, but she still just beat the sound of footsteps.  Dropping the last gift, LE sprinted to the chimney and dove, flying up the opening and popping out at the top before the humans even got the door open.

          She slipped off the bricks, dropping into her sleigh and gave the deer a thumbs up.  The team all shook their antlers in a show of congratulation, the tiny jingle bells making a tinkling sound.

          A voice echoed up from the ground.  "Did you hear that?"

          LE silenced the deer with a finger to her lips.

          "Colonel, I think you're hearing things."

          "Blackwood, I know I heard something."

          "What?"

          There was a pause.  "It sounded like tiny jingle bells."

          LE grinned.

          "And I suppose that thud we heard was a reindeer slipping on the roof?"

          Lorelei's eyes widened.  These guys were good.  Scary good.

          There was a "Hrumph," and the sound of boots stomping back toward the two-story house.

          _Great_ , LE thought, _I'm going to have to go in with awake humans in the house.  Santa was going to owe her overtime on this one_.  She turned in the sleigh seat and made her calculations for reaching the larger house's roof.  Not too hard, but she'd better do it before the turned out the lights and the deer were in the dark again.

Turning back around, she gathered up the reins and snapped them.  The reindeer sprang off the roof, executed a perfect close-quarter turn and barrel-rolled over to land on the second roof next to the largest chimney.  Lorelei bounced out of the sleigh, snatched her bag of holding and popped to the top of the bricks.  The fire burning beneath her was a little larger, but she was sure that she'd be fine, thanks to elf magic.  It was a genetic thing.

          With a quick command to keep the muscles twitching in case they had to make a fast getaway, LE dove down the opening, zinging into the living room just as the front door slammed shut.

 

          Heading straight for the ten foot tall tree, LE let her bag fall from her shoulder.  There wasn't a lot of room under the tall spruce, so she flew over closer to the French doors.  As soon as she passed, another set of alarms went off.  Boots pounded for the living room.

          Surprised, LE dropped the bag and beat a beeline for the first cover she saw.  Peeking up and over the edge of one of the stockings, hung by the chimney with care, she watched two men enter the room.

          "Well, _something_ set off the motion detectors!" one of them growled.

          Motion detectors?  Well, well, well, that was a new one.  What did these people think they had here?  Ft. Knox?  That was an all-night job for even the best elves.

          She could hear tapping echoing down the flew.  Great, now the reindeer were getting nervous.

          "You hear that?" the darker of the two men said.

          LE decided they were both cute, for humans, and wondered what the black-haired one would look like with pointed ears.

          "Probably just the reindeer on the roof," the second, curly-headed man replied.

          Lorelei's large eyes grew even wider.  He knew!  They must be trying to capture her!

          "Look, Blackwood, I'm gonna find whoever this is and if it's one of your—"

          Blackwood… a perfectly good Elf name.

          "Colonel, you have an overactive imagination."

          But what kind of name was Colonel?

          Deciding she'd better quiet the anxious deer or risk the dark-haired one climbing up onto the roof to see what was there, LE swan-dived out of the sock and shot up the chimney.  Emerging outside, she had a short, but heartfelt talk with the team, explaining that the other elves were starting to complain about the leather shortage.  The deer took the story to heart and promised not to do any more prancing until they got home.

          Diving back down the opening, LE hovered in the fire smoke.  The two humans were still in the room, but someone had turned off the alarm.  She looked across the room to where her bag lay under the tree.  If they found that…

          She chewed three nails off before convincing herself that she was just going to have to go for it.  It was relatively dark now, just the dying fire and the lights on the tree illuminating the room.  Plenty of shadows to hide in, and if all else failed, she had her can of 'human-sleep' tucked in her pocket.  One of these days they were going to develop a brand for cats.  They were the worst – claws… teeth… agile…

          Taking a deep breath, LE revved up, then flew from the fire at top speed.  Hugging the backs of the furniture, she arrived at the tree.

          "Damn it, Blackwood, I can feel it.  Someone's here."

          "Paul, it's just your imagination.  There's nothing here.  Let's chalk it up to the spirit of Christmas and go back to bed?"

          Definitely, she thought.  And any time, too.

          Pulling the gifts out, she carefully arranged them at the back of the tree, then crept forward to sit on one of the lower branches and watch.

          "Yeah, I guess you're right.  I'll have Norton check the alarms tomorrow and the Squad can run a full—"

          "Not tomorrow," Blackwood interrupted.  "Tomorrow's Christmas, Paul.  Can't it wait until the next day?"

          The black-haired human gave his companion a lopsided smile.  "Yeah, I suppose it can.  Hell, maybe it was Santa and his elves."

          _Hrumph_ , LE thought.  _Santa hasn't worked in centuries, and only one elf is needed for this simple task_.  Still, she was glad she'd come to this house.  The residents were definitely in need to the gifts she'd left.  Packages of love, health, luck, and good fortune.


End file.
